I could quite drop the look of severity with which I was endeavoring to
shame this young man into some decent show of interest in this place,
and assume the more becoming aspect of a lady caught unawares at an
early morning hour plucking flowers from a stunted syringa, a gentleman
stepped into sight on the other side of the fence with a look and a bow
so genial and devoid of mystery that I experienced for the first time
since entering the gloomy precincts of this town a decided sensation of
pleasure.
"Miss Butterworth," explained Mr. Knollys with a somewhat forced gesture
in my direction. "A guest of my sisters," he went on, and looked as if
he hoped I would retire, though he made no motion to welcome Mr. Trohm
in, but rather leaned a little conspicuously on the gate as if anxious
to show that he had no idea that the other's intention went any further
than the passing of a few neighborly comments at the gate.
I like to please the young even when they are no more agreeable than my
surly host, and if the gentleman who had just shown himself had been
equally immature, I would certainly have left them to have their talk
out undisturbed. But he was not. He was older; he was even of sufficient
years for his judgment to have become thoroughly matured and his every
faculty developed. I therefore could not see why my society should be
considered an intrusion by him, so I waited. His next sentence was
addressed to me.
"I am happy," said he, "to have the pleasure of a personal introduction
to Miss Butterworth. I did not expect it. The surprise is all the more
agreeable. I only anticipated being allowed to leave this package and
letter with the maid. They are addressed to you, madam, and were left at
my house by mistake."
I could not hide my astonishment.
"I live in the next house below," said he. "The boy who brought these
from the post office was a stupid lad, and I could not induce him to
come any farther up the road. I hope you will excuse the present
messenger and believe there has been no delay."
I bowed with what must have seemed an abstracted politeness. The letter
was from New York, and, as I strongly suspected, from Mr. Gryce. Somehow
this fact created in me an unmistakable embarrassment. I put both letter
and package into my pocket and endeavored to meet the gentleman's eye
with my accustomed ease in the presence of strangers. But, strange to
say, I had no sooner done so than I saw that he was no more at his ease
than myself. He smiled, glanced at William, made an offhand remark or so
about the weather, but he could not deceive eyes sharpened by such
experience as mine. Something disturbed him, something connected with
me. It made my cheek a little hot to acknowledge this even to myself,
but it was so very evident that I began to cast about for the means of
ridding ourselves of William when that blundering youth suddenly spoke:
"I suppose he was afraid to come up the lane. Do you know, I think
you're brave to attempt it, Trohm. We haven't a very good name here."
And with a sudden, perfectly unnatural burst, he broke out into one of
his huge guffaws that so shook the old gate on which he was leaning that
I thought it would tumble down with him before our eyes.
I saw Mr. Trohm start and cast him a look in which I seemed to detect
both surprise and horror, before he turned to me and with an air of
polite deprecation anxiously said:
"I am afraid Miss Butterworth will not understand your allusions, Mr.
Knollys. I hear this is her first visit in town."
As his manner showed even more feeling than the occasion seemed to
warrant, I made haste to answer that I was well acquainted with the
tradition of the lane; that its name alone showed what had happened
here.
His bearing betrayed an instant relief.
"I am glad to find you so well informed," said he. "I was afraid"--here
he cast another very strange glance at William--"that your young friends
might have shrunk, from some sense of delicacy, from telling you what
might frighten most guests from a lonely road like this. I compliment
you upon their thoughtfulness."
William bowed as if the words of the other contained no other suggestion
than that which was openly apparent. Was he so dull, or was he--I had
not time to finish my conjectures even in my own mind, for at this
moment a quick cry rose behind us, and Lucetta's light figure appeared
running toward us with every indication of excitement.
"Ah," murmured Mr. Trohm, with an appearance of great respect, "your
sister, Mr. Knollys. I had better be moving on. Good-morning, Miss
Butterworth. I am sorry that circumstances make it impossible for me to
offer you those civilities which you might reasonably expect from so
near a neighbor. Miss Lucetta and I are at swords' points over a matter
upon which I still insist she is to blame. See how shocked she is to see
me even standing at her gate."
Shocked! I would have said terrified. Nothing but fear--her old fear
aggravated to a point that made all attempt at concealment
impossible--could account for her white, drawn features and trembling
form. She looked as if her whole thought was, "Have I come in time?"
"What--what has procured us the honor of this visit?" she asked, moving
up beside William as if she would add her slight frame to his bulky one
to keep this intruder out.
"Nothing that need alarm you," said the other with a suggestive note in
his kind and mellow voice. "I was rather unexpectedly intrusted this
morning with a letter for your agreeable guest here, and I have merely
come to deliver it."
Her look of astonishment passing from him to me, I thrust my hand into
my pocket and drew out the letter which I had just received.
"From home," said I, without properly considering that this was in some
measure an untruth.
"Oh!" she murmured as if but half convinced. "William could have gone
for it," she added, still eying Mr. Trohm with a pitiful anxiety.
"I was only too happy," said the other, with a low and reassuring bow.
Then, as if he saw that her distress would only be relieved by his
departure, he raised his hat and stepped back into the open highway. "I
will not intrude again, Miss Knollys," were his parting words. "If you
want anything of Obadiah Trohm, you know where to find him. His doors
will always be open to you."
Lucetta, with a start, laid her hand on her brother's arm as if to
restrain the words she saw slowly laboring to his lips, and leaning
breathlessly forward, watched the fine figure of this perfect country
gentleman till it had withdrawn quite out of sight. Then she turned, and
with a quick abandonment of all self-control, cried out with a pitiful
gesture toward her brother, "I thought all was over; I feared he meant
to come into the house," and fell stark and seemingly lifeless at our
feet.
X
SECRET INSTRUCTIONS
For a moment William and myself stood looking at each other over this
frail and prostrate figure. Then he stooped, and with an unexpected show
of kindness raised her up and began carrying her toward the house.
"Lucetta is a fool," he cried suddenly, stopping and giving me a quick
glance over his shoulder. "Because folks are terrified of this road and
come to see us but seldom, she has got to feel a most unreasonable dread
of visitors. She was even set against your coming till we showed her
what folly it was for her to think we could always live here like
hermits. Then she doesn't like Mr. Trohm; thinks he is altogether too
friendly to me--as if that was any of her business. Am I an idiot? Have
I no sense? Cannot I be trusted to take care of my own affairs and keep
my own secrets? She's a weak, silly chit, to go and flop over like this
when, d--n it, we have enough to look after without nursing her up
and--I mean," he said, tripping himself up with an air of polite
consideration so out of keeping with his usual churlishness as to be
more than noticeable, "that it cannot add much to the pleasure of your
visit to have such things happen as this."
"Oh, don't worry about me!" I curtly responded. "Get the poor girl in.
I'll look after her."
But as if she heard these words and was startled by them, Lucetta roused
in her brother's arms and struggled passionately to her feet. "Oh! what
has happened to me?" she cried. "Have I said anything? William, have I
said anything?" she asked wildly, clinging to her brother in terror.
He gave her a look and pushed her off.
"What are you talking about?" he cried. "One would think you had
something to conceal."
She steadied herself up in an instant.
"I am the weakest of the family," said she, walking straight up to me
and taking me affectionately by the arm. "All my life I have been
delicate and these turns are nothing new to me. Sometimes I think I will
die in one of them; but I am quite restored now," she hastily added, as
I could not help showing my concern. "See! I can walk quite alone." And
she ran, rather than walked, up the few short steps of the porch, at
which we had now arrived. "Don't tell Loreen," she begged, as I followed
her into the house. "She worries so about me, and it will do no good."
William had stalked off toward the stables. We were therefore alone. I
turned and laid a finger on her arm.
"My dear," said I, "I never make foolish promises, but I can be trusted
never to heedlessly slight any one's wishes. If I see no good reason why
I should tell your sister of this fainting fit, I shall certainly hold
my peace."
She seemed moved by my manner, if not by my words.
"Oh," she cried, seizing my hand and pressing it. "If I dared to tell
you of my troubles! But it is impossible, quite impossible." And before
I could urge a plea for her confidence she was gone, leaving me in the
company of Hannah, who at this moment was busying herself with something
at the other end of the hall.
I had no wish to interfere with Hannah just then. I had my letter to
read, and did not wish to be disturbed. So I slipped into the
sitting-room and carefully closed the door. Then I opened my letter.
It was, as I supposed, from Mr. Gryce, and ran thus:
"DEAR MISS BUTTERWORTH:
"I am astonished at your determination, but since your desire
to visit your friends is such as to lead you to brave the
dangers of Lost Man's Lane, allow me to suggest certain
precautions.
"First.--Do not trust anybody.
"Second.--Do not proceed anywhere alone or on foot.
"Third.--If danger comes to you, and you find yourself in a
condition of real peril, blow once shrilly on the whistle I
inclose with this. If, however, the danger is slight, or you
wish merely to call the attention of those who will be set to
watch over you, let the blast be short, sharp, and
repeated--twice to summon assistance, three times to call
attention.
"I advise you to fasten this whistle about your neck in a way
to make it easily obtainable.
"I have advised you to trust nobody. I should have excepted Mr.
Trohm, but I do not think you will be given an opportunity to
speak to him. Remember that all depends upon your not awakening
suspicion. If, however, you wish advice or desire to make any
communication to me or the man secretly holding charge over
this affair in X., seek the first opportunity of riding into
town and go at once to the hotel where you will ask for Room 3.
It has been retained in your service, and once shown into it,
you, may expect a visitor who will be the man you seek.
"As you will see, every confidence is put in your judgment."
There was no signature to this--it needed none--and in the packet which
came with it was the whistle. I was glad to see it, and glad to hear
that I was not left entirely without protection in my somewhat hazardous
enterprise.
The events of the morning had been so unexpected that till this moment I
had forgotten my early determination to go to my room before any change
there could be made. Recalling it now, I started for the staircase, and
did not stop though I heard Hannah calling me back. The consequence was
that I ran full tilt against Miss Knollys coming down the hall with a
tray in her hand.
"Ah," I cried; "some one sick in the house?"
The attack was too sudden. I saw her recoil and for one instant hesitate
before replying. Then her natural self-possession came to her aid, and
she placidly remarked:
"We were all up to a late hour last night, as you know. It was necessary
for us to have some food."
I accepted the explanation and made no further remark, but as in passing
her I had detected on this tray of food supposed to have been sent up
the night before, the half-eaten portion of a certain dish we had had
for breakfast, I reserved to myself the privilege of doubting her exact
truthfulness. To me the sight of this partially consumed breakfast was
proof positive of there being in the house some person of whose presence
I was supposed to be ignorant--not a pleasant thought under the
circumstances, but quite an important fact to have established. I felt
that in this one discovery I had clutched the thread that would yet lead
me out of the labyrinth of this mystery.
Miss Knollys, who was on her way down-stairs, called Hannah to take the
tray, and, coming back, beckoned me toward a door opening into one of
the front rooms.
"This is to be your room," she announced, "but I do not know that I can
move you to-day."
She was so calm, so perfectly mistress of herself, that I could not but
admire her. Lucetta would have flushed and fidgeted, but Loreen stood as
erect and placid as if no trouble weighed upon her heart and the words
were as unimportant in their character as they seemed.
"Do not distress yourself," said I. "I told Lucetta last night that I
was perfectly comfortable and had no wish to change my quarters. I am
sorry you should have thought it necessary to disturb yourself on my
account last night. Don't do it again, I pray. A woman like myself had
rather put herself to some slight inconvenience than move.
"I am much obliged to you," said she, and came at once from the door. I
don't know but after all I like Lucetta's fidgety ways better than
Loreen's unmovable self-possession.
"Shall I order the coach for you?" she suddenly asked, as I turned
toward the corridor leading to my room.
"The coach?" I repeated.
"I thought that perhaps you might like to ride into town. Mr. Simsbury
is at leisure this morning. I regret that neither Lucetta nor myself
will be able to accompany you."
I thought what this same Mr. Simsbury had said about Lucetta's plan, and
hesitated. It was evidently their wish to have me spend my morning
elsewhere than with them. Should I humor them, or find excuses for
remaining home? Either course had its difficulties. If I went, what
might not take place in my absence! If I remained, what suspicions might
I not rouse! I decided to compromise matters, and start for town even if
I did not go there.
"I am hesitating," said I, "because of the two or three rather
threatening-looking clouds toward the east. But if you are sure Mr.
Simsbury can be spared, I think I will risk it. I really would like to
get a key for my door; and then riding in the country is so pleasant."
Miss Knollys, with a bow, passed immediately down-stairs. I went in a
state of some doubt toward my own room. "Am I surveying these
occurrences through highly magnifying glasses?" thought I. It was very
possible, yet not so possible but that I cast very curious glances at
the various closed doors I had to pass before reaching my own. Such a
little thing would make me feel like trying them. Such a little
thing--that is, added to the other things which had struck me as
unexplainable.
I found my bed made and everything in apple-pie order. I had therefore
nothing to do but to prepare for going out. This I did quickly, and was
down-stairs sooner perhaps than I was expected. At all events Lucetta
and William parted very suddenly when they saw me, she in tears and he
with a dogged shrug and some such word as this:
"You're a fool to take on so. Since it's got to be, the sooner the
better, I say. Don't you see that every minute makes less our chances of
concealment?"
It made me feel like changing my mind and staying home. But the habit of
a lifetime is not easily broken into. I kept to my first decision.
XI
MEN, WOMEN, AND GHOSTS
Mr. Simsbury gave me quite an amiable bow as I entered the buggy. This
made it easy for me to say:
"You are on hand early this morning. Do you sleep in the Knollys house?"
The stare he gave me had the least bit of suspicion in it.
"I live over yonder," he said, pointing with his whip across the
intervening woods to the main road. "I come through the marshes to my
breakfast; my old woman says they owes me three meals, and three meals I
must have."
It was the longest sentence with which he had honored me. Finding him in
a talkative mood, I prepared to make myself agreeable, a proceeding
which he seemed to appreciate, for he began to sniff and pay great
attention to his horse, which he was elaborately turning about.
"Why do you go that way?" I protested. "Isn't it the longest way to the
village?"
"It's the way I'm most accustomed to," said he. "But we can go the other
way if you like. Perhaps we will get a glimpse of Deacon Spear. He's a
widower, you know."
The leer with which he said this was intolerable. I bridled up--but no,
I will not admit that I so much as manifested by my manner that I
understood him. I merely expressed my wish to go the old way.
He whipped up the horse at once, almost laughing outright. I began to
think this man capable of most any wicked deed. He was forced, however,
to pull up suddenly. Directly in our path was the stooping figure of a
woman. She did not move as we advanced, and so we had no alternative but
to stop. Not till the horse's head touched her shoulder did she move.
Then she rose up and looked at us somewhat indignantly.
"Didn't you hear us?" I asked, willing to open conversation with the old
crone, whom I had no difficulty in recognizing as Mother Jane.
"She's deaf--deaf, as a post," muttered Mr. Simsbury. "No use shouting
at her." His tone was brusque, yet I noticed he waited with great
patience for her to hobble out of the way.
Meanwhile I was watching the old creature with much interest. She had
not a common face or a common manner. She was gray, she was toothless,
she was haggard, and she was bent, but she was not ordinary or just one
of the crowd of old women to be seen on country doorsteps. There was
force in her aged movements and a strong individuality in the glances
she shot at us as she backed slowly out of the roadway.
"Do they say she is imbecile?" I asked. "She looks far from foolish to
me."
"Hearken a bit," said he. "Don't you see she is muttering? She talks to
herself all the time." And in fact her lips were moving.
"I cannot hear her," I said. "Make her come nearer. Somehow the old
creature interests me."
He at once beckoned to the crone; but he might as well have beckoned to
the tree against which she had pushed herself. She neither answered him
nor gave any indication that she understood the gesture he had made. Yet
her eyes never moved from our faces.
"Well, well," said I, "she seems dull as well as deaf. You had better
drive on." But before he could give the necessary jerk of the reins, I
caught sight of some pennyroyal growing about the front of the cottage a
few steps beyond, and, pointing to it with some eagerness, I cried: "If
there isn't some of the very herb I want to take home with me! Do you
think she would give me a handful of it if I paid her?"
With an obliging grunt he again pulled up. "If you can make her
understand," said he.
I thought it worth the effort. Though Mr. Gryce had been at pains to
tell me there was no harm in this woman and that I need not even
consider her in any inquiries I might be called upon to make, I
remembered that Mr. Gryce had sometimes made mistakes in just such
matters as these, and that Amelia Butterworth had then felt herself
called upon to set him right. If that could happen once, why not twice?
At all events, I was not going to lose the least chance of making the
acquaintance of the people living in this lane. Had he not himself said
that only in this way could we hope to come upon the clue that had
eluded all open efforts to find it?
Knowing that the sight of money is the strongest appeal that can be made
to one living in such abject poverty as this woman, making the blind to
see and the deaf to hear, I drew out my purse and held up before her a
piece of silver. She bounded as if she had been shot, and when I held it
toward her came greedily forward and stood close beside the wheels
looking up.
"For you," I indicated, after making a motion toward the plant which had
attracted my attention.
She glanced from me to the herb and nodded with quick appreciation. As
in a flash she seemed to take in the fact that I was a stranger, a city
lady with memories of the country and this humble plant, and hurrying to
it with the same swiftness she had displayed in advancing to the
carriage, she tore off several of the sprays and brought them back to
me, holding out her hand for the money.
I had never seen greater eagerness, and I think even Mr. Simsbury was
astonished at this proof of her poverty or her greed. I was inclined to
think it the latter, for her portly figure was far from looking either
ill-fed or poorly cared for. Her dress was of decent calico, and her
pipe had evidently been lately filled, for I could smell the odor of
tobacco about her. Indeed, as I afterward heard, the good people of X.
had never allowed her to suffer. Yet her fingers closed upon that coin
as if in it she grasped the salvation of her life, and into her eyes
leaped a light that made her look almost young, though she must have
been fully eighty.
"What do you suppose she will do with that?" I asked Mr. Simsbury, as
she turned away in an evident fear I might repent of my bargain.
"Hark!" was his brief response. "She is talking now."
I did hearken, and heard these words fall from her quickly moving lips:
"Seventy; twenty-eight; and now ten."
Jargon; for I had given her twenty-five cents, an amount quite different
from any she had mentioned.
"Seventy!" She was repeating the figures again, this time in a tone of
almost frenzied elation. "Seventy; twenty-eight; and now ten! Won't
Lizzie be surprised! Seventy; twenty--" I heard no more--she had bounded
into her cottage and shut the door.
"Waal, what do you think of her now?" chuckled Mr. Simsbury, touching up
his horse. "She's always like that, saying over numbers, and muttering
about Lizzie. Lizzie was her daughter. Forty years ago she ran off with
a man from Boston, and for thirty-eight years she's been lying in a
Massachusetts grave. But her mother still thinks she is alive and is
coming back. Nothing will ever make her think different. But she's
harmless, perfectly harmless. You needn't be afeard of her."
This, because I cast a look behind me of more than ordinary curiosity, I
suppose. Why were they all so sure she was harmless? I had thought her
expression a little alarming at times, especially when she took the
money from my hand. If I had refused it or even held it back a little, I
think she would have fallen upon me tooth and nail. I wished I could
take a peep into her cottage. Mr. Gryce had described it as four walls
and nothing more, and indeed it was small and of the humblest
proportions; but the fluttering of some half-dozen pigeons about its
eaves proved it to be a home and, as such, of interest to me, who am
often able to read character from a person's habitual surroundings.
There was no yard attached to this simple building, only a small open
place in front in which a few of the commonest vegetables grew, such as
turnips, carrots, and onions. Elsewhere towered the forest--the great
pine forest through which this portion of the road ran.
Mr. Simsbury had been so talkative up to now that I was in hope he would
enter into some details about the persons and things we encountered,
which might assist me in the acquaintanceship I was anxious to make. But
his loquaciousness ended with this small adventure I have just
described. Not till we were well quit of the pines and had entered into
the main thoroughfare did he deign to respond to any of my suggestions,
and then it was in a manner totally unsatisfactory and quite
uncommunicative. The only time he deigned to offer a remark was when we
emerged from the forest and came upon the little crippled child, looking
from its window. Then he cried:
"Why, how's this? That's Sue you see there, and her time isn't till
arternoon. Rob allers sits there of a mornin'. I wonder if the little
chap's sick. S'pose I ask."